Paul McCartney puts Cigar Box Guitars on the Center Stage

This has been quite a week for the cigar box guitar movement. First, Sir Paul McCartney appears onstage at the 12.12.12 Hurricane Sandy benefit concert with a four-string cigar box guitar, in the midst of of a Nirvana reunion. This was by far the biggest public exposure a cigar box guitar had ever seen, and ever since the Internet was abuzz with people asking: what was that instrument Paul was playing? Visits to CigarBoxNation.com, cbgitty.com, and related Facebook pages are way up.

Then last night (Saturday, December 15) Sir Paul does it again and appears on Saturday Night Live, again with Nirvana and again with his 4-string CBG!

In two fell swoops Paul McCartney has unequivically thrust the cigar box guitar onto the world stage. No more can “real” guitar people scoff and say they are toys, or that they are not “real” instruments. I don’t like to overstate things, but it seems like this is a defining moment in the history of the cigar box guitar.